


Lacrimosa

by CopperBeech



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 1790s, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hell has all the first-rate composers, Mozart Requiem, Prater, Vienna, mozart - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:20:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22256353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CopperBeech/pseuds/CopperBeech
Summary: Two adversaries mark a recent death on a spring morning in Vienna.“They’re saying he told his wife it was for his own funeral. I don’t suppose you meant him to think that.”“I told him it was from Count von Walsegg, that bugger’s always commissioning music from someone. He was pretty well arseholed at the time though.”“And that the request came from a stranger who hid his face.”“It was cold, angel. And my eyes wouldn’t've done his nerves a bit of good.”
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 27
Kudos: 56





	Lacrimosa

“You always liked the funny ones,” said Aziraphale. “The romantic comedies. And that one with the bird-catcher that you told me about. Why a Requiem Mass?”

They were strolling in the Prater, pretending to admire the daily parade of carriages and riders, some of the horses with nodding feathered crests, the wealthy of Vienna reminding one another of their worth and station. Spring was just beginning to load the branches; they hadn’t seen each other since the previous summer, when both their Head Offices had taken an interest in the new French Constitution. (They’d had crepes, again.) Aziraphale would have looked at home in one of the ornate coaches, all brocade, lace, and powdered wig; the demon's green knee-breeches and frogged jacket were subdued by comparison.

“Because there’s so much death and mourning,” said Crowley. “Because people need help with it. And it wouldn’t get him in trouble like that Schikaneder play.”

“He was one of yours, wasn’t he?”

“Could y'miss it? Drank, chased women, played snooker, gutter mouth, smarted off at everyone. Think he had all Seven Deadlies covered.”

“That Clarinet Quintet. That was the voice of – “ Aziraphale paused.

“Go on, say it.”

“Well – I admit I’ve never even heard an angel’s voice quite that beautiful.”

“Yours, maybe.”

Aziraphale paused in his stride for a sidelong glance. The demon was looking straight ahead, and his own voice wasn’t steady. He seemed to be brushing something out of his eye with the fingertip of a white glove.

“Tempting me to Pride, aren’t you.”

Crowley didn’t answer that one way or the other. There was a distant noise of hunting hounds from far off in the trees. People didn’t chase quarry in earnest in the woods of the Prater, but it was a diversion, a reason to own hounds and the necessary wardrobe.

“Last voices I remember hearing in Heaven weren’t saying anything very nice, angel.” The demon nodded, bowing slightly from the waist, as one of the court ladies – Aziraphale couldn’t remember all her titles – passed on horseback, her side-saddle posture spreading an absurd froth of peach-colored skirts practically the length of the horse.

“I heard he’d started drinking up money when anyone gave it to him.”

“Some of it. One’ve the reasons I gave him a commission. That, 'n'so he’d write something that'd prove to everyone he was worth it.”

“Did he finish it?”

“Not exactly. The _Kyri_ e and the _Dies Irae_. Enough've the rest sketched out for his last student to work with.”

“ _Lord, have mercy upon us._ And _Day of wrath.”_

“Might’ve been running in his head maybe.”

“They’re saying he told his wife it was for his own funeral. I don’t suppose you meant him to think that.”

“I told him it was from Count von Walsegg, that bugger’s always commissioning music from someone. He was pretty well arseholed at the time though.”

“And that the request came from a stranger who hid his face.”

“It was cold, angel. And my eyes wouldn’t've done his nerves a bit of good.”

They walked a little further in silence.

"I got a note from Gabriel," said Aziraphale finally. “I’m to give a nudge here and there on behalf of the widow. _So that she might prosper and preserve his last work_.”

“Nice of Heaven to think of her. They threw him in a lime pit with all the other paupers.”

“Well, he _was_ one of yours.”

“He was one of _Hers.”_

“Aren’t we all?”

Crowley did meet his eyes then, or as much as he _could_ meet them through heavily smoked lenses. Aziraphale looked as if he were considering, as if what he finally said, when he went on, wasn’t what he had started out to say.

“Dear, it hurts me too. I know I’m a bit heretical, but sometimes I could wish – well, for Her to see to it Herself that some people be treated – more kindly.”

“Free will, angel. Took Her hand right out of it. And you know who did that.”

“You’re getting broody again. Let’s try one of these new coffee houses.”

Crowley managed a small, rather watery smile.

 _“ '_ l'right, then. _Andiam.”_

_finis_

**Author's Note:**

> Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart died on December fifth, 1791, essentially of poverty and the disease and drunkenness that tend to go with it. He was starved for commissions, and the premiere of _The Magic Flute_ had lost him the charity of his fellow Masons, who saw the opera as a betrayal of their secrets.
> 
> Constanze Mozart circulated the story that the Requiem Mass uncompleted at the composer’s death was commissioned by a stranger who called at his rooms in the dead of night, muffled to unrecognizability, and that Mozart believed the funeral involved would be his own. He left debts and was buried in a mass grave.
> 
> There are several important Andiams ("let's go") in opera, but my favorite is the conclusion of _La Ci Darem La Mano_ in _Don Giovanni_ , as the hell-bound Don absconds for a dalliance with the pure (?) bride. Crowley may have known Mozart's librettist. (Bonus music geeking: for a triumph of vocal artistry, visual acting and top-tier temptation, complete with apple, here is the duet sung by Bryn Terfel and Hei-Kyung Hong at the Met in 2007. Grainy, and the titles are in Spanish, but no real translation needed.)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqPcb1nKZYg
> 
> Here's the Lacrimosa that Mozart was working on at the time of his death.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1-TrAvp_xs


End file.
